"'Tarry thee one moment, for I would assure myself that all is safe. Should'st unfriendly eyes see us here, my life would be the cost.'
"He listened intently for a moment, but all was still. Then, by some means unknown to me, he slid back a panel in the side of the corridor, and a puff of cold, damp air rushed into our faces. A dark, yawning gulf was before me, and I drew back with an involuntary shudder; but Kaosp bid me enter.
"'Haste thee down these steps,' said he; 'they will take thee to a passage, which follow until thou reachest the garden of Siccoth-trees; and there Volinè awaits thee. I will meet thee here when thou returnest. But heed thee well the fleeting time.'
"In another moment Kaosp had closed the panel, and I was groping my way down the steps in perfect darkness. Thirty-four deep steps I counted, and then I came to a passage with a smooth floor, which I walked along with caution, feeling the walls on either side as I went. For fifty paces I walked thus, the damp, poisonous air well-nigh choking me; and then I could hear the playing of the fountains, and directly afterwards I beheld the bright stars shimmering before me.
"I waited and listened for a few seconds, before venturing from the passage out into the open garden; but, with the exception of the splashing fountains, all was silent as death. Then I walked stealthily onwards, with eyes striving to penetrate the gloom, now on this side, now on that, and seeking to discover her whom I loved. Presently, I saw her coming towards me with fleeting steps, down a broad pathway between the shrubs. I ran to meet her, and in another moment we were clasped in each other's arms.
"'Harry!'
"'Volinè!'
"And so we met again; and as we uttered each other's name, in our reunion joy, I rained kiss after kiss upon her soft cheeks and willing lips; and the hot, scalding tears of grief, that trickled down her white, sorrow-stricken face, ploughed, as with molten fire, across my own. Oh, the joy and yet the agony of that midnight tryst! We had met, yet only to say good-bye. I and my darling were to love no more in life, for in three fleeting days I must die. Then a great mad thought came unto me; and I planned, in a moment of time, that Volinè and I would flee—that I would take her with me to some far distant place, where we could live and love without fear.
"'Darling, we meet once more, but our lives are cloaked with sorrow. You know my fate. It is your royal father's will that I and my comrades die at sunset, three days hence. Death is dreadful to me since the hour I saw and loved you. I, who have met this grim majestic thing called Death in a hundred shapes without fear, do now see it approach with craven nerveless terror, for it comes to part me from you. Dear one, this shall not be. Let us haste away together to-night, let us fly from Edos now!'
"'Harry, thou sayest that which is impossible, which cannot be,' she sobbed. 'Knowest thou not that every way from Siccoth is guarded well; nay, doubly guarded since I prevailed upon the King, my father, to let thee and thy companions wander therein.'